This new bill is about carrots, not sticks –it would not impose any mandates on cities and towns. Instead, it would simply allow localities to use the so-called “price-preference” when buying food should they choose. And by centering their purchasing decisions on key values like sustainability and health, government agencies can bring about immediate benefits to those being served institutional food and shift the overall marketplace toward better food systems.
This is one reason the Food and Agriculture arm of the United Nations has stated that public procurement of sustainable food is “a key game changer for food systems transformation,” because it can impact “both food consumption and food production patterns” as well as “deliver multiple social, economic, and environmental benefits towards sustainable food systems for healthy diets.”
Maximizing the Bill’s Support of Local and Sustainable Food
The bill now heads to Governor’s Hochul’s desk, weeks or months down the line, for her signature. If the Governor’s Office seeks to enter into discussions with the Legislature over so-called “chapter amendments,” it may open up an important opportunity to amplify the impact of the legislation. One of several key changes to the bill the Governor’s Office could request is to expand the procurement options cities and towns can utilize to buy local and sustainably produced food.
How? Recall that the Good Food NY Bill reforms the current “lowest responsible bidder” procurement mechanism — the first option under Section 103 of General Municipal Law — to allow municipalities to pay food vendors up to 10% more than the lowest bidder if the food meets some of the new criteria– local, sustainability, nutrition, animal welfare, etc.
But as currently drafted, the bill does not clearly extend this new price preference to he second primary procurement option under state General Municipal Law – namely, the more sophisticated “best value” process.
This gap leaves a lot on the table because the “best value” procurement process is especially important to New York City and other large municipal buyers around the state. Indeed, New York City alone is one of the largest food buyers in the state and nation – for example, the NYC public schools serve roughly 800,000 meals per day– and the city is increasingly using the best value method in its procurements.
Just last month, New York City directed all mayoral agencies to use, with some exceptions, the “best value” method of procurement for all contracts for goods as well as standard and professional services. Among other objectives, moving all mayoral agency procurement processes to best value allows the City to maximize contracting opportunists for small “Minority and Women Owned Business Enterprises (M/WBE).” Existing New York State procurement law explicitly supports this objective by allowing both state and municipal agencies to give extra weight to proposals from M/WBE vendors through their “best value” procurement decisions.
So, the bottom line is extending the Good Food NY Bill’s seven articulated purchasing criteria to cover not only (a) the “lowest responsible bidder” option, but also (b) the “best value” process in Section 103 of General Municipal Law would dramatically increase opportunities for cities and towns to support local and sustainably managed farming operations – as well as M/WBE vendors – through their procurement processes. Of course, cities and towns do not always have the extra money to apply a 10% price preference to their food contracts. But again, since the Good Food NY Bill simply provides municipalities the option of using the price preference, there are only upsides to broadening any final bill language to incorporate the powerful “best value” purchasing tool that the State Legislature added to General Municipal Law in 2012.
Ensuring a thriving agricultural sector in New York – home to more than 33,000 farms – is critical to the state’s economy and providing greater access to high-quality, local food. Promoting sustainably produced food is good for our environment, our communities, and our health. The Good Food NY bill marries these two objectives by reforming the state’s outdated municipal procurement laws and unlocking hundreds of millions of dollars of new purchasing power. And that seems like a great recipe for good (food) policy.
